no title

The Niehaus way

Retiring Senate leader set an example that lawmakers should follow

About our Editorials

Dispatch editorials express the view of the
Dispatch editorial board, which is made up of the publisher, the president of
The Dispatch, the editor and the editorial-writing staff. As is the traditional newspaper
practice, the editorials are unsigned and intended to be seen as the voice of the newspaper.
Comments and questions should be directed to the
editorial page editor.

With the retirement of state Senate President Tom Niehaus, Ohio is losing a steady, moderate and responsible leader more interested in solving problems than in advancing an ideological agenda. In an era when factional partisans repeatedly have hijacked the Statehouse to push divisive, unproductive measures, such a loss is worrisome.

Senate colleagues gave the New Richmond Republican a warm send-off last week at the unveiling of his official portrait (a trapping he tried to turn down, asking that the money be spent instead on an interactive display for the Statehouse museum), praising his consensus-building style and efforts to foster good will, both between the parties and among often-squabbling Republicans.

The public can only hope those lawmakers will pay Niehaus tribute in the most meaningful way possible, by maintaining the reasoned approach he established.

Niehaus, a former newspaper executive in the Cincinnati area, barely won his Senate seat in 2004, prevailing by just 22 votes in a primary against more-conservative state Rep. Jean Schmidt. He earned a reputation as a lawmaker who was as willing to listen as to talk.

His common sense likely was never more sorely tried than in his term as speaker, over the contentious last two years.

Even as legislators took on the Herculean task of righting a state budget that was $8 billion in the hole, the bitter fight over Senate Bill 5, the bill to reduce collective-bargaining rights for public employees, began to take shape. In addition, Republicans and Democrats sparred repeatedly over controversial proposals to change Ohio election law.

Although Niehaus’ caucus ended up on the losing side of Senate Bill 5 after voters overwhelmingly rejected it at the polls, he deserves credit for trying to maintain a civil dialogue on it.

Through it all, Niehaus worked to rein in the worst excesses of social-conservative Republicans bent on their causes above all else.

Niehaus understood that Ohioans want their state government to provide the best environment for jobs and economic development, while responsibly providing help for those in need.

While he worked to support constructive changes in Medicaid, which consumes a third of the state’s budget, he blocked a number of measures that would have done little more than attract lawsuits and divide the public. These included a bill that would have enabled a power grab by for-profit charter-school operators and one to require photo identification to vote (tellingly, similar laws have been challenged in a number of states).

The gatekeeping continued up to his final weeks in office, when he made it clear that neither the “heartbeat bill,” which would have been the nation’s most-restrictive anti-abortion law, nor a measure to effectively bar funding for Planned Parenthood would become law on his watch.

Those actions earned Niehaus the wrath of the most-conservative elements of his own party, but they were done in the best interest of Ohioans, which should be every officeholder’s standard.